[Necro] How do you think the final battle of Heart of the Swarm will play out

[DarthYam]

In Wol there were three phases. The touch down, the weakening of the zerg forces, and than the final clash to defend the artifact. I think that there may be three missions devoted to attacking Korhal (pretty sure that's the final location given the ending). I also think this is where Kerrigan will finally lay the past to rest and let go of her fears and doubts.


Mission 18: Mengsk has realized that Kerrigan has come for his head, so he has pulled out all of the stops to wipe her out. At this point he's in bed with the dark voice to shore up his power (since public opinion is fully on the side of the Raiders and most of his military no longer supports him). This would be slicing through the Korhal defense network to make planetfall and would be fought IN SPACE!!!!!!!!!! Sort of like the battle before new gettysberg in SC 1. They make planetfall, but Mengsk unleashes hybrids that prevent further assault on the capital. Kerrigan realizes that they need to take out the Hybrid breeding labs. Duran reveals that he's there. They have a conversation before asking "which first" an allusion to the question he asked just before she betrayed Raynor Mengsk and Fenix years ago.



Mission 19: Preferrably called Absolution. This is the climax of Kerrigan's arc. Raynor and the Raiders, as well as Zeratul, all show up, since Zeratul realizes that this battle will be important in determining the future

The primary objective starts out with the hybrid facilities that Mengsk is producing. They are coincidentally located on the same place where Kerrigan murdered Fenix and Duke. Kerrigan has to find ways to surgically strike them at the same time with a combined raiders force. You take them out, but than Duran enters the battlefield.
At this point the objective changes to taking out Duran. Duran drops the mask and reveals his true hideous form. Which is like a hybrid. He and Kerrigan face off, and during the fight Duran mocks her about what she did here 6 years ago. He also tries to use a mind whammy on her to shatter her spirit before he kills her. Kerrigan remembers everything she's done, and all her pain and guilt threatens to consume her. Ultimately, Lessara and Zeratul (or whoever) manage to create a mind link to help her fight off Duran. Zeratul, Raynor and Lessara manage to give Kerrigan a pep talk through the link that allows her to finally forgive herself for what she's done. She realizes that she can never undo her past but she can build a better future. She finally fights off Duran's influence and manages to kick the crap out of him. After an intense psychic and hand to hand battle Kerrigan manages to defeat and mortally wounds Duran. Duran tells her that she will never be happy, and that even if she defeats his master she will always be alone. Kerrigan tells him that she won't and leaves him to die and succumb in his own blood.

Mission 20: A new beginning

The Final mission, and the essential curbstomping of Mengsk and his forces. This is basically a rampage through Korhal city (or august grad) before finally surrounding the main palace. Mengsk has determined to make his final stand. He unleashes his elite guard and a few more hybrids generously supplied by the dark voice. The final round is just before the palace. A collection of battleships and Hybrid Reavers/Destroyers bars the way, so you have to take them out.

Cue ending. Kerrigan takes Mengsk down and resolves to help the Zerg forge a new destiny. Cue credits. Maybe after scene where Amon (the Dark Voice) is enraged at the loss of Duran and the fact that Kerrigan is alive. He realizes that now things are more complicated and begins to make plans for attacking the protoss.

[Hawki]

More a point form response rather than quotes-I'm lazy like that. Anyway:

-Three missions idea would make sense in a...well, sense, since that's how many missions we got on Char in WoL. On the other, HotS has less missions total, so I think maybe two.

-The hybrid labs are an okay idea. With Duran however, I think he should make an appearence in the campaign beforehand, even if he's using his Narud persona.

-I'm actually against Zeratul or Lessara turning up in the finale. Just as the end missions of WoL were symbolic of humanity coming into its own, being able to stand against the zerg on their own terms, I think HotS (and LotV) should follow suit. While I think the Raiders can play a part, it should be minor. It's Kerrigan's fight against Mengsk, and the focus has to remain on her.

-Wouldn't mind if Duran escapes. While he has business with Kerrigan, he could also be put to use as an antagonist against Zeratul in LotV.

-City would be Augustgrad. That's where the palace is.

-Doubt the Dark Voice will make an appearence. I think it's been stated they want each installment to stand on its own. For Raynor, it was saving Kerrigan. For Kerrigan, presumably it'll be leading the zerg away, for good. While I'm sure we'll get some DV-controlled zerg in LotV, I doubt/hope that Kerrigan will make an appearence.

[topsecret221]

This is based off of the assumption that the "leaked" HotS ending is canon. This is both not confirmed and a very bad ending to the first of two expansions. The zerg being innocent creatures that Kerrigan frees will also make me incredibly angryface >=(
So let's assume HotS endings without taking into account that possible (and hopefully scrapped) ending.

[Hawki]

Actually, I hope that ending is kept. But regardless, even if you're against how the zerg are treated, it's pretty much a given IMO that Mengsk will get what's coming to him and ergo, it'll likely end on Korhal.

[topsecret221]

I have no problem with Mengsk getting his ass kicked (actually, I do, but that's just because Mengsk hasn't really been made to look as capable as he was back in Brood War...), but I do have an issue with the zerg being freed. Of course, smart Kerrigan from back in the Brood War days knew that leaving Mengsk in the ruins of his shattered Dominion was a better fate than death.

I mostly just wish that the story would take a turn back down the darker path and steer away from how kid-friendly the story is becoming right now.

[Hawki]

More lack of quotes (overseas work, using a Mac...god I miss my PC...)

-I don't want to get into another debate about Mengsk's competence/lack of it, but I'll venture that part of the reason I think it's time his head landed in the bucket is because of what he's become. As a rebel, he had to be smart. As a tyrant, he's lost the will/ability to be what he once was. With his entire crusade being founded on vengeance rather than idealism, it's inevitable IMO he'd reach the point he has by WoL.

-I didn't really get the sense of the zerg being free per se in the leaked ending. Kerrigan does say "the zerg are free now" but also "I'll help them (find the answer), giving me the impression that she was effectively going to take them away to be isolated, to keep them in check, to free them from the wiles of the Overmind/Dark Voice. It's basically a way of giving the zerg an end scenario. A good idea IMO because there's always a limit with what you can do with bug species in sic-fi, and the zerg are no exception. There's not much left one can do with them.

-Never really got a sense of kid friendliness myself. I mean, we haven't got the same gruesome deaths of terrans as in back in the old days, but there was also more of an emotional disconnect back in the earlier games. I felt much more for the Dominion marines on Char, than, say, the people of Tarsonis back in the first game, who only get green text telling us about their demise (show, don't tell and all that).

[DarthYam]

I think that the only role Lessara and Raynor play is helping Kerrigan finally come to terms with her past and finally forgive herself and work for atonement. I chose Korhal because that was the site of her imoh her biggest atrocity, or at least the one that symbolized the monster she had become. The fenix and duke death site was chosen for the same reason. HEre is were she should finally face her past, and move on. Duran is a manipulator, so I think he will be willing to bring up her past. I can see him saying "monster. murderer traitor. do you truly think you will ever achieve redemption for your past." or something like that. Lessara is a living reminder of Kerrigan's past, and Kerrigan is uncomfortable when Lessara calls her out on her crimes. I think Lessara forgiving her can be symbolic, showing Kerrigan that she is not chained by her past and can become a better person. She needs to forgive herself, but she also needs to show to herself that she is not the queen of blades, or not doomed to become her. Raynor's arc was about facing the ghosts of his past; Kerrigan has that as well, but she also has the doubt of how much the Queen of blades was the zerg overmind and how much was her own darkness Either way, something happens during Duran's mind whammy that allows her to finally come to terms with her past and resolve to stand and fight.

[Turalyon]

-Doubt the Dark Voice will make an appearence. I think it's been stated they want each installment to stand on its own. For Raynor, it was saving Kerrigan. For Kerrigan, presumably it'll be leading the zerg away, for good. While I'm sure we'll get some DV-controlled zerg in LotV, I doubt/hope that Kerrigan will make an appearence.

O.o

I hope you don't mean that there'll be "no DV appearance whatsoever in HotS" because at this stage, the threat of the DV really needs to be established in HotS in order to properly connect the series as a trilogy and to set-up the DV as a viable and worthwhile (in the sense that in its current state, it really shows that the DV is nothing more than a two-bit villain for the purpose of being a two-bit villain) antagonist for the last chapter.

This also applies to Kerrigan. Kerrigan has to make an appearance in LotV as the previous chapters stress her importance in the defeat of the DV. To not have her appear in LotV would make all the previous chapters that was heavily focused on her be a colossal waste of time. There are already arguments that there actually isn't enough material to justify a trilogy and something like this would just prove that to be true.

Kerrigan does say "the zerg are free now" but also "I'll help them (find the answer), giving me the impression that she was effectively going to take them away to be isolated, to keep them in check, to free them from the wiles of the Overmind/Dark Voice.

Somehow this does not sound like 'freedom' to me...

Either way, there is no meaningful difference between a 'free' zerg or an enslaved one. The closest thing Zerg ever got to freedom was when the Overmind died and lo and behold, the Zerg continued to be what they were made to be. They were just a lot more disorganised. The Zerg have no real underlying cultural identity (they're not Warcraft Orcs) since all of them in their current states are nothing more than the end result of a forced evolution - that is, weaponised organisms with no other capacity but to ravage things.

[Hawki]

-Misphrased the DV...sort of. On one hand, I think the Dark Voice's presence needs to be felt in HotS, but whether it needs to appear is another matter. It's not the best example in the world, but I'd imagine something akin to Harbinger-holograms and such for ME2, actual appearence in ME3. There's of course him in the ending of ME2 but it's something I don't think would suit HotS well. I don't want Kerrigan's moment of glory overshadowed by tall, dark and ugly talking in the...well, dark.

-Concerning Kerrigan...yeah, that's a good point. However, I'll go down the path of wishful thinking and state my interpretation/hope that her role as saviour really applies to her being in control of the zerg, thus preventing the Dark Voice from controlling them, rather than any great act/set of acts. My projections for LotV is that the final mission(s) will be a sort of mirror image of In Utter Darkness, only with the protoss facing more favourable odds. I'm really not fond of the idea of the whole terranes, zerg and protoss united vs. hybrids/Dark Voice because a) it's been done before and b) would take away from the protoss's time to shine, if you get my drift.

[Visions of Khas]

One of Kerrigan's goals in Heart of the Swarm is the development of a Metamorph, a Zerg strain capable of self-directed evolution. This also implies independent thought and will. This paves the way for a freedom for the Zerg they'd otherwise be incapable of, releasing them from the Hivemind instinct and, ultimately, from the Dark Voice.

I do not mind this, so long as they do not become "good". So long as they retain a beastial presentation and dark motives, I'm more than happy to witness another step in Zerg evolution.

StarCraft is essentially WarCraft In Space at this point. SO the path I outline above is sorta foretold by the fate of the Scourge of WarCraft, who fracture into multiple factions.

I think it would be very interesting to play with this in the last battles on Korhal. I think the Metamorphs will assert their power, but realize Kerrigan's overall usefullness and grant her theater command of the engagement on Korhal. The Zerg will have multiple "commanders" on the field, perhaps some of them leading independent Broods to help in a multi-pronged push on Augustgrad. Perhaps Kerrigan will re-teach the Zerg to work together as they take down the Dominion.

Some interesting possibilities.